It wasn’t totally impossible but Sauron woul dhave had the advantage. Now, had Aragorn just ra off immediately to fight Sauron, he’d have lost badly. Had he hung out and built his power, learned to control the ring and bend others to his will, then he’d have had a much better shot. But even Saruman and Galadriel would have faced a hard fight against Sauron.
You are just suppose to assume that it was indeed a dwarven contraption and leave it at that. 
The Hobbit is a fairy tale. The Lord of the Rings is an Epic story. The fact that an epic story grew as a sequel to the Hobbit, means that many oddities crept into the story that would not have, if the Lord of the Rings was written, unencumbered by the Fairy Tale that was the Hobbit.
Keep in mind, that almost all of the classic Arthurian Tales were filled with beastly anachronisms as 11th through 15th century writers were writing badly about a 5th or 6th century King.
BTW: Good analysis on the clock making, I do think the dwarves could indeed and had a small clock making business going. It is a stretch, but at least one that can be somewhat accepted.
Sauron feared this greatly. It is possible that with a little time, Aragorn, Gandalf, Galadriel or even Saruman may have been able to defeat Sauron if they learned to control* the Ring. Of course, they still would not be able to destroy Sauron and he probably would have found a way to beat them in the end, on the other hand Gandalf would be a “Terrible” tyrant. He was the wisest of the Maia and may have made Sauron his slave and lackey. Saruman was not as wise, but learned and skillful. He to would have been especially frightening to Sauron.
Aragorn, well Aragorn, may have won and then Sauron would have found a trick to corrupt him or betray him. He probably would have feared Gandalf allowing Aragorn to rally the troops and then turning around a seizing the Ring for himself once Sauron and his army were defeated.
Jim
- Of course none of them would be able to control the Ring, it would eventual control them in many subtle ways.
To what extent did the Elves (or the Dwarves for that matter) engage in agriculture?
Why were the Southwest coastal regions of Middle Earth unpopulated?
Was it practical for Aragorn to prohibit men from entering the Shire given the potential for commerce between a restored Arnor and Lindon/Blue Mountains?
Was Tolkien aware that potatoes did not exist in medieval Europe?
Dwarves had almost no agriculture, they relied on trade. In hard times, they mined coal and iron.
Elves were very good at agriculture, but it is rarely mentioned. Somehow, the elves on Mirkwood were able to trade for many goods from Laketown, I have no clue what their income source was. There were farms and fields mentioned a few times in the Silmarillion.
The South West Coastal region was not unpopulated, but rather under-populated. This is amazing, as coastal, areas should have a higher population. In general Western Middle Earth was very under-populated. There was plenty of prime farming areas all abandoned. Centuries of warfare and plagues had left a great toll on the population of Western Middle Earth.
Was it practical for Aragorn, possibly, as he did not restrict Dwarves from trading with the Shire or for the Shire to trade in Bree. I am sure over the years and after his death, enterprising humans and Hobbits would find plenty of ways around the Kings decree.
Tolkien was aware that neither Potatoes nor Tobacco were European Crops. I have no good explanation. Let us just call them Anachronisms and be done with it. If you like, Potatoes could simply be the useful English translation for some other closely related Tuber in the nightshade family that is now long extinct. It is possible at least. Ditto the Pipe Weed. Perhaps Pipe Weed really was a mild form of hemp. Those who like Tom Bombadil, usually like to think so.
Jim
So does Peter Jackson, apparently:
Sorry, but that ain’t tobacco he’s talking about there. 
Well, Aragorn’s great-great-great <etc> -grandfather (or perhaps great-uncle, I think) overthrew Sauron even without a ring. The old guy did have such an impressively powerful Numenorean army behind him that all of Sauron’s troops ran away, but he did take Sauron prisoner.
[Hey, this is just appendix stuff, not even getting to the Silmarilion or anything]
Only a distant cousin. The common descent of Elendil’s line and Ar-Pharazôn was all the way back at Tar-Elendil.
That is roughly 2500 years apart. As none of Ar-Pharazôn line is known to have survived, it is very unlikely that “uncle” could be used.
Jim
nitpick - saw an old Bracket (shelf) Clock on Antiques Road Show that had a pendulum. You couldn’t see it unless you took off the back, but it had one. It also had pivot at the top of the pendulum so that the clock could be moved without compromising the rate of swing. It looked much simpler than a spring driven clock. And it would work very well on a mantel.
From Tolkien’s letter 246
Read the whole fascinating letter. Center for the American Idea
I always imagined that the Elves were more, umm, cerebral, and more at peace with themselves and their place in the Universe.
Humans, on the other hand, seem to have a drive towards change. The drive that causes a man to not merely await fate, but to try and shape it themselves. The drive to explore, and see what lies over that hill over yonder. Basically, a zest for life, the passion (and optimism) of youth.
In a bad man, this zest may lead to ill advised grabs for power. (Like the Numenorean’s.)
In a good man, like Aragorn, it might seem oddly attractive or chivalric.
But that is my own speculation and so forth. Nothing I can recall from Tolkiens own explanations.
Actually, I don’t think Tolkien had any problem with New World crops, etc., showing up in M-E, since the lands of the world were changed again between the time of the LotR and the present. The only problem he seemed to have had was the New World derivation of the WORDS (potato, tomato; hence, Sam calling them “taters”).
It’s important to remember that the various parts of Middle Earth are somewhat deliberately anachronistic, representing various archetypes that Tolkien loved. So the Shire is a barely disguised Edwardian English countryside, complete with squires, mantlepieces, pocket handkerchiefs, gardeners, mills, teakettles, pipes, clocks, umbrellas, birthday parties, and second breakfasts. And this is the life of Tolkien’s childhood that was lost with World War One. But it also incorporates the ancient folkloric England of the Anglo-Saxons, and so we have the Rohirrim who are simply Anglo-Saxons on horseback, we have Laketown which was modelled after an iron age lake settlement, we have Merlin, we have King Arthur, we have Beorn, we have Aesir and Vanir and dwerrows and elves and so forth. Now, when the tobacco-smoking tea-drinking potato-eating bourgeois Edwardian hobbits encounter iron age Viking warriors, it is a bit of a culture clash. But that’s part of the fun.
WhatExit–as soon as I posted that, I thought of Rosie, and that gossipy woman in Minas Tirith! I realize the whole thing is a part of Tolkien’s time etc–I just wish there were more Eowyns and Lothens etc. How about a female version of Gandalf for example?
I don’t mind the lack of detail re agriculture etc in the elvish world. I do have trouble imagning elvish children, though. I have no trouble picturing dwarvish children…go figure!
I have always looked at the Eye sort of askance. When I am being very silly, I think that all it needs is a great vial of Visine.
I prefer The Hobbit as a tale; I think the LOTR gets bogged down by the weight of its own legend/mythology. Sorry about the misspelling of Silmarillion–I was in a hurry. Maybe someday I’ll read it.
I don’t get why Turin is considered such a great guy, he was a complete asshole!
Amen and Hallelujah! He was the first emo kid, seriously. Every time anything went wrong for him, he threw a great huge fit, acted as if he were the only person in the history of the world who anything bad had happened to, and made sure that every single person who ever encountered him knew how badly Fate had screwed him up the pooper.
Wait, Turin is a tragic figure and yes a bit of a self-centered jerk. Who said he was a great guy? You lost me on this one.
Many different people made the mistake of being taken in by him. He was handsome and a great warrior. He spoke for brave deeds and was a strong leader. So if you are talking about the other people of Middle Earth that made of the mistake of putting trust in him, I will present it this way.
If you were a warrior in a warrior clan, would you follow a great warrior or a lame politician that counseled caution?
It was probably easy to be taken in by him. It happens in today’s world to.
eleanorigby: I agree, there was little of females outside of Galadriel and Eowyn. (Of course these two should have made up for much.) You will do better with women in the Silmarillion and don’t worry about the spelling. I was just trying to quietly point it out. Not be a snit about it.
Jim
LOTR only takes place 7052 years after the awakening of men. The population of earth wasn’t large in 93000B.C. In addition, there were two “world wars”(The War of the Last Alliance, The War of Wrath), a host of lesser conflicts, a great plague, and an ice age like winter in that time.
In Robert Foster’s A Guide to Middle Earth, it says:
“Any mortal possessing one of the Rings would not die, but would continue living in great weariness; the Dwarves, however, were unaffected.”
In my faulty memory, I must have conflated the two properties. My bad.
So, who are the viking warriors? And who are Gondor modelled after?